U.S. spot Bitcoin exchange-traded funds posted $635.6 million in net outflows on Thursday, their largest daily withdrawal since June, as Bitcoin fell alongside technology shares and a broader retreat from risk assets. The reversal followed $528.4 million of net inflows on Wednesday and showed how quickly institutional demand can shift during a sharp market sell-off.
BlackRock’s iShares Bitcoin Trust, IBIT, accounted for the largest share of redemptions, losing $254.1 million. Fidelity’s Wise Origin Bitcoin Fund, FBTC, recorded $217.5 million in outflows, while ARK Invest and 21Shares’ ARKB lost $109.4 million.
Bitwise’s BITB and Grayscale’s GBTC also registered net withdrawals. Morgan Stanley’s MSBT was the only fund to report a net gain, attracting $2.3 million, while the remaining products saw no daily change in flows.
MSBT, which began trading in April, has recorded only one day of net outflows since its launch. Its small inflow did little to offset withdrawals from the category’s largest and most established funds, where the day’s activity was concentrated.
A weekly gain survives the daily reversal
Thursday’s exit did not erase the week’s earlier demand. U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs remained up $442.7 million on a net basis for the week, supported by $526.7 million in inflows on Monday, $23.2 million on Tuesday and $528.4 million on Wednesday.
The weekly result places Thursday’s withdrawals in a more measured context. Fund flows can reflect large allocation changes by institutions, portfolio rebalancing, hedging activity or short-term trading around macroeconomic events, rather than a uniform shift in views on Bitcoin’s long-term direction.
Since the first U.S. spot Bitcoin ETFs began trading in January 2024, the group has accumulated more than $57 billion in combined net inflows. Assets under management across the products stood above $100 billion, illustrating the scale of capital that can now move through regulated Bitcoin funds during periods of market stress.
That large asset base also makes daily swings more visible. A withdrawal of more than $600 million is substantial, but it represents a relatively limited portion of the capital held across the entire U.S. spot Bitcoin ETF market.
Bitcoin tracks a technology-led sell-off
Bitcoin traded near $81,500 early Friday, down 3.4% over the previous 24 hours. The decline coincided with a Wall Street sell-off that extended into Asian equities after weak technology earnings, concern over the scale of artificial-intelligence spending and rising geopolitical tensions.
The Nasdaq Composite dropped 2.6% on Thursday, its steepest decline since June. The S&P 500 lost 1.2%, marking its weakest session since July.
Bitcoin’s reaction added to evidence that the asset continues to trade closely with growth-oriented technology stocks during abrupt risk-off episodes. While Bitcoin has distinct supply mechanics and an ETF market of its own, large macro-driven moves can bring it into the same selling cycle as high-beta equities, particularly when traders reduce exposure across volatile assets at once.
The ETF outflows therefore arrived during a session defined less by a Bitcoin-specific catalyst than by broad pressure on risk-sensitive markets. That distinction matters for reading the day’s flows: redemptions from Bitcoin funds occurred while tech shares, digital assets and other growth-linked positions were simultaneously under pressure.
Leveraged positions deepen the decline
More than $440 million in leveraged cryptocurrency positions were liquidated over 24 hours, according to CoinGlass. Long positions accounted for $397 million of that total, indicating that traders positioned for higher prices bore most of the forced closures.
Liquidations occur when collateral in a leveraged trade no longer meets an exchange’s maintenance requirement. The platform automatically closes the position, often selling the underlying asset into a falling market. When long liquidations rise quickly, those forced sales can amplify an initial price decline.
CoinGlass recorded $51.59 million in liquidations during one hour on Thursday, with buy-side positions accounting for 97% of the wipeout. The concentration of long liquidations suggests that the market entered the sell-off with bullish leverage still in place, leaving traders exposed when prices moved lower.
The event also contrasts with the steadier message from the ETF market over the full week. ETFs finished the week’s reported period with net inflows, while derivatives traders faced a rapid unwind. Spot fund allocations and leveraged futures positions frequently respond to different time horizons, and the latter can move far more violently during intraday declines.
Ethereum funds also return to redemptions
U.S. spot Ethereum ETFs recorded $110.6 million in net outflows on Thursday after taking in $14.9 million the previous day. The turn mirrored the direction of Bitcoin ETF flows and reinforced the market-wide character of the retreat.
Solana and Hyperliquid ETFs also posted net withdrawals, while XRP funds added $3.6 million. The mixed result among smaller crypto fund categories suggests that selling was widespread but not uniform, with some products continuing to draw limited allocations despite the broader market decline.
Bitcoin derivatives pricing showed a modest improvement in longer-term upside expectations despite the immediate sell-off. Derive’s options-market data placed the implied probability of Bitcoin trading above $100,000 by Christmas at 12%, up from 9.7% a week earlier. The implied probability of a move below $70,000 fell to 11% from 15.6% over the same period.
Those probabilities reflect options pricing rather than forecasts. They show that, even after Thursday’s slide and the largest ETF withdrawal day in months, the derivatives market had not broadly shifted toward expecting a deep year-end Bitcoin decline.
Amid ETF outflows and tech-driven volatility, understand Bitcoin’s strategic reserve narrative and its long-term impact on institutional demand.
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